Mindset, Karma and a Tibetan Dinner

I was up in the mountains last week with two friends, researching a story and taking some time to soak in the clean air and stunning mountain views. It was a world away from Delhi’s steaming hubbub.

On the last night, we had dinner with the owners of our guesthouse and a number of other Tibetan people, all of whom are close to the Dalai Lama and his teachings. They spoke animatedly in lyrical Tibetan, with its soft, whispery tones that are so gentle on the ears. I’ve come to the conclusion that Tibetans really know how to laugh. They hardly stopped all evening. It was wonderful!

Sitting on my left was the owner of our guesthouse, who himself had taken the treacherous ten day journey through the Himalayan mountains from Tibet to India when he was only eight. He doesn’t remember much about it, he said.

My friend, whom I’d been plying with questions about Tibetan Buddhism all weekend, encouraged me to go ahead and ask him some of them.

I plunged ahead with the first.

It felt a little trite; but I’ve always been curious about this.

“How is it that reincarnation works if the total number of life forms keeps increasing on the planet?”, I asked. “Where are all of these new souls coming from?”

“Ah”, he said. “We have a very simple answer for this. We don’t believe that this is the only universe that exists. There are many worlds that exist far beyond our knowledge, which also contain life forms. That’s how we get around it”, he said, winking.

“And what about the different forms of life”, I asked, “is it possible to be reincarnated in both directions? Like, if you were a human in one lifetime, could you become an ant in the next? Is one considered ‘higher’ or ‘lower’ than another?”

“Yes. A human form is considered the most desirable, because when you take a human form, you have the possibility to achieve enlightenment. It’s because of our capacity for consciousness”, he said, pointing towards his gently lined forehead.

“But we believe it’s absolutely possible to be reincarnated in both directions”, he added, after a moment’s pause. “Much depends on the karma you accumulate during your lifetime”.

“We tend to believe that once someone has reached a certain level of consciousness, such as our high monks and teachers, it is unlikely that this will happen, but there are so many layers and implications to karma beyond the level of the mind. We accept how much we cannot understand, and instead distill it into the simple principle that every action has an effect”.

He stopped for a moment and then, seemingly reminded of something else that was connected, he continued.

“Karma is a very central element to our Buddhist thinking. When difficult or challenging things happen in our lives, seeing them as karmic somehow allows us to be far more accepting of them, without judgement. We see these things as the accumulation of actions from the past, including past lifetimes. Seeing life that way, it can give you a lot more peace.

You see, in the West, when something bad happens, the first thing they say is, ‘why did this have to happen to me?’ We are freed from such questions, which allows us to be far more accepting of whatever happens in life. Thinking this way can give you so much more mental peace.”

He went on. “We have a very senior female monk here in Dharamsala who suffered greatly at the hands of the Chinese. She was tortured heavily while in Tibet. She was asked what her most difficult moment was through it all, and she said, it was the moment that she lost her compassion for the Chinese. I couldn’t believe it. These words taught me so much. I will never forget this story.”

“Our inner state is all about attitude: about mindset. How you feel about everything in life is about this, about the attitude you bring to it – that is what this really shows you. Your attitude can change everything, particularly your inner state.”

“Putting it into practice is difficult, though”, he added, grinning.

My friends and I were listening intently, absorbing something in his words that was so simple as an idea, yet so deeply meaningful – be you a Buddhist or not, and even whether you believe in karma or not.

His message was about the way we experience and engage with life. About the way we embrace or reject whatever comes our way, and about whether we can find ways to respond rather than react to life’s constant motion. I found myself reflecting on the role of unconditional love in our lives, in allowing us to respond from the heart to whatever we experience.

“How we understand karma is another matter”, he added, “but this is where, as Buddhists, we have trust. We can’t understand all of these dynamics with our mind. We must simply seek to act rightly in our lives. To do good to the best of our ability”.

As I looked around the room, I found myself deeply grateful for those moments in time when, through sharing something with another, you are given the opportunity for new insights. New ways of seeing, and perhaps remembering.